In case you thought I had kicked the bucket or something.

Yes, I’m alive. No, I wasn’t abducted by aliens (like Kalpak was).

I’ve just been very lazy. Then varieties of crap that’s been happening (refer to last post, for a gist). And then the general blah-ness. The sudden cold-wave in Hyderabad a few weeks back made me super-lethargic. And then I fell ill. My dad visited for a week. Instead of me taking care of him, he ended up taking care of me, starting from cleaning the house to having my coffee ready by the time I woke up in the morning *hiding face in shame*. We went to Ramoji Film City also. Four-and-a-half years of living in Hyderabad, and I finally had to wait for my dad to come down to go there.

After he left, it was a crazy fortnight of work. So crazy, that I didn’t have time to even eat. Even otherwise, I’ve been floating around in Zombieland for a while. Time to come back from there, because although the stay there is pretty good, let’s face it, the biryani is much better down here on earth. And that’s what matters at the end of the day, right?

Sincere apologies for not replying to any comments, from my regular bloggers and a few new bloggers. Extremely sorry. No excuse.

So Bhargavi and Keirthana bestowed me with the Veteran Blogger award. Yay!! :) Thank you so much, lovely ladies.


Bhargavi, the soon-to-be-mom, has a kickass tongue-in-the-cheek sense of humour that you will absolutely love. She’s a model reader who religiously comments on every post of mine, even the crappy ones. I’d linked her post Sambhar-ism once before on one of my posts, so some of you might be familiar with her. For the rest of you who’re not, head over and say a hi, ok? And drop a wish too, because she’s soon going to pop. (Sorry, babe, couldn’t help that one :P ) And ooh ooh! She’s also going to get published soon! Super-awesome, no?!

Keirthana’s writing is like a mountain spring- clear, smooth, sometimes meandering, but always purposeful. Her encouragement and appreciation has been a major boost to me. And I’m sure it will continue to be. She is also a wonderful reader who makes it a point to comment on every post of mine. She says that my blog is the one that made her realize what blogging is. This, while making me feel proud on one hand, also makes me realize that I actually managed to influence somebody! That never happens! :/ Thanks a lot, Keirthana!

I know I’ve done this tag before as well, when I got the award the first time. But I want to write today. Not particularly because I’ve had a brainwave or anything, but because if I don’t, I might just forget how to.

We all know the drill. I’m just going to skip it and do the random facts thingie. Because you know…umm.. uh.. ok. No reason. I just want to write about myself. Again. :/ Go sue. Hmph.

1) I cannot bear hunger. If I’m hungry and I don’t get food immediately, I get a headache. Then I get cranky and start snapping at random people. If you tell me we’ll have lunch together, and then you make me wait for an hour, you’re dead meat. No pun intended.

2) The smell and taste of milk nauseates me. I’m a fan of milk-powder, because it tastes and smells so much nicer. It’s always been a tug-of-war at home, trying to make me drink milk. When I make coffee or tea, the milk to water ratio is 1:4. My dad makes tea and coffee in like a litre of milk. When he visited me in Hyderabad, he made me drink more milk in a week than I’ve had in a year. Blech! :/ My kitchen was smelling of it for days!

3) My name is Divya and I’m not ambitious.
Or maybe I have/had too many of them. At one time, I wanted to be a teacher. That gave way to fashion designer. Then I wanted to be an Ob-Gyn(yes, seriously. Inspired by Readers' Digest's Book Bonus stories about brave doctors who save babies' and mothers' lives magically). This one quickly gave way- because, you know, it actually involves a lot of studying and work, neither of which I was willing to do- to engineer. This one got blotted out due to the increasing number of red marks on my report card. Those two years (11th & 12th standard) are still a haze to me. What did I do, where did I go, whom did I meet? All I remember is consistently failing. After this, during my graduation, I wanted to be a journalist. Then I wanted to get into radio. All through my MA, I was consistent about this one, and even got my first job in it. I loved it. But then the hectic lifestyle (or no-life-at-all-style) and bad pay got to me. Quit it, got into Corp Comm. Currently, I have no idea what I want to do or be. The column is empty.

But you know, the one thing that has remained a constant all through my life (or from the time I can remember), through all the other ambitious phases, is “I want to be a writer”…

4) I love listening to stories, especially love stories. Whenever I come to know that someone has a girlfriend/boyfriend or had a love marriage, the first thing I ask is “So what’s your story?”

5) I’ve realized that blogging has given a whole new meaning to ‘random’. There is nothing random about ‘random’ anymore.

I think that’s enough random for now. Actually, if random is what you’re looking for, then I can put it in one big, huge, bullet point- MY LIFE.

But…

There is no time to weep.
I have stories to file and guest-post promises to keep.
And miles to go before I sleep…
And miles to go before I sleep…

Yes, I'm bad at poetry. I know that.

I'm not tagging anyone for the award because I cannot give it to just one blogger. There are many of you out there whose blogs I read and love. So this goes out to each and every one of you.